Be grateful that after thirty years of marriage I’m coming home, not docking in someone else’s port,” said the husband.
“What if I had cheated on you too?” Marina asked.
“For a woman, cheating is abnormal; for a man, it’s natural. Besides, who needs you at fifty and a bit?”
Marina had long suspected Gennady was cheating on her. He started taking care of his appearance meticulously, even taking his phone with him to the bathroom, and when his wife called him “elephant” as she had for all thirty years before, he snapped:
“Aren’t you ashamed of baby talk? That’s only for young girls.”
Still, Marina convinced herself: “Gena and I have been through fire, water, and having two kids — you don’t just shrug that off. He yelled because he’s tired, and hides his phone because of work secrets and all that.”
She kept telling herself this until Gennady confessed honestly:
“I have another woman. I don’t want to lie to you, so I’m telling you straight away.”
Marina bit her lip to suppress a nervous chuckle, because her husband looked so proud.
“Probably thinks that unsolicited honesty makes him a good person,” she thought.
“How could you after so many years of marriage?!” Marina blurted out.
“Exactly. I’ve lived with the same woman for thirty years — that’s like eating only fried potatoes for thirty years. Tasty, but gets boring. Besides, I’m almost sixty, I’ve achieved a lot and earned the right to happiness! I’m young at heart!”
“Seeing another woman, hurting your wife — that’s happiness?”
“Don’t dramatize. Two of my colleagues left their families; all the money went with them, their wives were left with nothing, but I’m not going anywhere. I’ll keep living with you because I’m a decent man. I’ll just allow myself some small male pleasures now.”
Marina spent the whole night sitting in the kitchen, drinking tea and thinking about what to do.
“Maybe I should leave, but where? No savings, spent everything on the family. Besides, I don’t want to leave, I love Gena. I don’t believe our marriage means nothing to him — probably just a midlife crisis.”
But Gennady showed he took his “small pleasures” seriously. In the evening, he ostentatiously put on his best suit, poured on cologne generously, and declared:
“I’m going to the theater.”
Inside Marina, everything screamed in pain, but she decided not to show her husband how deeply he hurt her.
“Have a good time,” she replied, though she knew perfectly well her husband wouldn’t be alone.
After Gennady left, Marina stood long in front of the mirror, looking at herself from every angle. The glass mercilessly reflected a pretty but life-weary woman.
“Yes, I’ve let myself go, gained weight, dress like an old woman, forgot to cover the gray… No wonder my husband looked at another woman. I’m even disgusted to look at myself. Today I’ll sign up for a beauty salon — not for him, but for myself.”
Gennady immediately noticed her changes but just snorted:
“Preening yourself? In this age, no matter what you do, you won’t regain beauty.”
“I don’t recognize you, Gena,” Marina couldn’t hold back. “A year ago you told me I was the most beautiful woman in the world, and now you throw dirt at me. What happened to you, why have you changed so suddenly?”
“I looked back and realized I’ve wasted my life serving others. First, I took care of you on maternity leave, then raised the kids to eighteen, then dragged them through university… I want to finally live for myself, without dependents on my neck.”
By the end of his speech, Gennady was almost shouting, so angrily it was as if he saw a mortal enemy before him.
“I sacrificed a lot too,” Marina reminded him. “I sang, wanted to go to the conservatory, but had to finish accounting courses quickly to start working, so you could make a career. I hate my job, but endured it for our children, for you, for our family.”
“You should be thanking me. I saved you from the biggest shame of your life, and the world from another mediocre singer because you’re far from Babkina.”
That mockery was the last straw for Marina. She remembered how young Gennady had begged, “Sing more, your voice is as beautiful as you are.”
“And now I’m ugly, old, voiceless… Can love really just die like that and leave only hatred?”
She looked into her husband’s indifferent, even slightly disgusted eyes and realized it could.
Marina thought the disgrace ended with that conversation, but the main trouble was ahead. It turned out Gennady told not only his wife but also their grown sons about his affair. They rushed to scold their father.
“Dad, are you crazy? What affairs at your age, especially with someone our age?!” the eldest snapped.
“You and Mom lived together for so many years, don’t disgrace yourself in your old age!” the younger one added.
“You’ll understand when you grow up,” Gennady smirked. “I fulfilled my duty to you all, so I have the right to live as I want. And if you insist I forget about myself again, remember I still support you. If you don’t like it, I’ll cut off the money — take care of yourselves.”
The sons fell silent, exchanged confused looks, then looked guilty at their mother.
“Sorry, Mom,” the younger one said apologetically.
“They traded their mother for money,” Marina thought bitterly.
As if that wasn’t enough, a week later a girlfriend, the main gossip in their circle, ran up to her. Pretending kindness and sympathy, she babbled:
“Your guy came to the corporate party with some broomstick who’s about twenty, can you imagine! And she’s so brazen, smiling at everyone, wagging her tail, showing off the earrings you gave her. Everyone else came with their wives, and he with a girl.”
The girlfriend fell silent and expectantly looked into Marina’s face.
“Thinks I’ll start a scandal or cry, wants fresh gossip,” Marina understood. “I won’t give her that pleasure.”
“Nice to hear Gena is generous and thanked the girl for her services,” Marina replied calmly.
Surprise and disappointment flickered on the girlfriend’s face at once.
After she left, Marina cried. All this time she held her emotions in, following the motherly lesson learned since childhood: “Only weak hysterics cry, who can’t stand up for themselves.”
But the public scandal broke her.
Waiting for her husband to come home from work, she threw a vase at him.
“You’ve gone mad!” Gennady shouted, fear flickering on his face for a moment.
“How nice it is to make a scene,” Marina thought, throwing something else at him.
“I tolerated your escapades, but you dragged this filth into the open! I’m talking about both your craziness and this girl you brought to the corporate party. Even if you don’t love me anymore, didn’t I deserve respect for thirty years of marriage?”
“I don’t want to be ashamed of my happiness. My marital duty to you is done, now I do what I want, you don’t boss me around.”
“Then I won’t be yours either!” Marina yelled in anger. “If you decided to live your life, so will I. I’ll get myself a man, will you like that?”
“Don’t make me laugh, who needs you? A woman over fifty. And men are polygamous, so it’s not even cheating, just the call of nature. A woman who cheats is another matter, so don’t even think about it, don’t disgrace my gray hair!”
“What gray hair? You’re bald!” Marina shot back.
“Why didn’t you wash my shirts?!” Gennady attacked Marina one morning.
While putting on lipstick, Marina replied:
“Because your shirts are no longer my life. Ask your girl to wash them while she earns her earrings.”
“You’re still my wife, and I support you!” Gennady got angry.
“I can support myself; you won’t be able to blackmail me with money like our sons,” Marina reminded him and snapped her compact shut. “Sorry, I have an appointment at the beauty salon.”
“You didn’t make breakfast either!” Gennady shouted from the kitchen, outraged.
“Order pizza; that’s what young people eat!” Marina called out before closing the door.
She rushed to the beauty salon and shops.
Before, a quarrel with her husband would have ruined her whole day; now she bubbled with joy like lemonade bubbles.
“Didn’t know it was so nice to tear yourself away from an old boring life.”
“Did you dye your hair?” Gennady suspiciously asked in the evening.
Marina shook her hair.
“I wanted to for a long time, but this color doesn’t suit a family woman — perfect for a free woman, though.”
“Ugh, nothing’s worse than a woman trying to look younger,” Gennady grimaced.
“Or an old man wearing cartoon T-shirts,” Marina replied, flicking her husband’s protruding belly.
“That’s fashionable,” the husband was offended.
“Only if worn by a young handsome guy.”
The new hair color gave Marina the feeling she could do anything.
“In some ways, Gena’s right; we’re always serving the family, the kids, not living for ourselves… Time to ask what I want from life and give it to myself,” she decided.
Marina changed her wardrobe, swapping the strict dresses and skirts she wore to work for light, flowing ones. She bought ripped jeans with torn knees — she’d long liked the rebellious style.
“Fit perfectly,” she praised her reflection. “Still look good, girlfriend!”
Of course, her husband didn’t like it.
“Cover up, nobody wants to see your skinny knees.”
“You’re trying to look younger yourself,” Marina noted.
“That’s different; men get better looking, it doesn’t suit women.”
Marina could have argued — stepping out in her new jeans and stylish hairstyle, she caught an interested male glance, something that hadn’t happened in ten years. The feeling was pleasant.
After changing her appearance, Marina decided to work on her inner self — her hobby. Singing lullabies to children or singing while washing dishes, she always dreamed of the stage.
“Maybe it’s too late for a career, but I can sing for myself,” she decided.
Fate seemed to step towards her when Marina saw an invitation to an amateur choir. At first, she was shy but relaxed seeing that most people were like her — adults wanting to dedicate some time to their dream. The compliments from the artistic director finally gave her hope.
“What a stunning deep voice you have, one could listen forever!”
Marina thought she hadn’t been this happy in a long time.
Her husband didn’t like her changes at all. Gennady didn’t intend to live with her as a wife, but was quite comfortable with Marina as a servant.
“You’ve gone completely out of control, you’re never home, don’t cook, barely clean!” he told her. “Don’t forget we live in my apartment, which I earned!”
“I fully repaid my debt caring for our children. And if you don’t like that I live here, we can split up and divide the apartment,” Marina suggested.
“You offer divorce so easily, don’t thirty years of marriage mean anything to you?”
Marina thought her husband was joking, but Gennady looked honestly disappointed and confused.
“It means a lot to me, that’s why I’m still here, but you were the first to betray our marriage,” Marina replied.
One day after rehearsal, a man who had joined the choir almost at the same time as Marina approached her.
“I wanted to admire your singing. Have you ever performed professionally? You have not only a voice but also looks and posture like a real artist.”
“Oh no,” Marina blushed.
“It’s been a long time since anyone complimented me; I forgot how to accept them. And he has such beautiful eyes…”
The man smiled at her, and Marina felt the forgotten flutter of butterflies in her stomach.
That’s how her romance with Igor began. At first, Marina was plagued by guilt, but by the third date it subsided, replaced by boundless happiness. She and Igor had much in common, and most importantly, he looked at her the way Gennady once had in youth.
Only one thing embarrassed Marina — Igor was ten years younger.
“That’s terrible, you got involved with an old woman!” she exclaimed when she learned his age.
“Marina, you’re not an old woman but a beautiful woman in her prime. And by the way, you look very young yourself.”
“You flatter me,” Marina blushed.
“It’s the truth. And here’s the truth: I’d really like to live together, not just see each other in bits.”
“Are you asking me to leave my husband?” Marina was surprised.
“I wouldn’t ask you, but if anything, know I’m here and waiting for you.”
Marina went home so lost in thought she didn’t notice how she arrived.
“Finally showed up!” her cheeky husband greeted her. “You’ve been staying out late like you’re eighteen again.”
Gennady laughed.
Marina looked at her husband but saw not her beloved Gena, but a grumpy stranger — bald, with disgusted downturned mouth corners, unattractive and unwanted.
“Thank you,” she said suddenly.
“For what?” the husband was confused.
“If not for your escapades, I’d still be sitting miserable and neglected. Now I have a beloved hobby and a man ten years younger with wonderful eyes and voice. And you — you’re my past.”
Hardly had she said this when Marina felt as if she’d dropped a stone from her feet and grown wings instead. She left, no longer paying attention to her husband.
Marina moved in with Igor and immediately filed for divorce. Soon after, she left her job because she was offered a position as a singing teacher. Though she now earned a bit less, she was insanely happy.
A couple of weeks later, Gennady called.
“Stop running around, come back home, I’ve forgiven you and am ready to start over. I even broke up with my girlfriend.”
“Better make peace because someone has to watch over you,” Marina replied. “And I’m too happy to go back. Your arrogant husband’s convictions will never change.”